Really really in love with this new painting I’m working on. Based on one of the drawings from my art house coop sketchbook project…

watercolor work in progress

Hoping to have it done in time for the SMARTS Call for artists for the 2nd annual Arts of the Community Exhibition. I might title it something like “Incubation” or “Incubators” or something incubating-related. Which makes me think about hatching baby chicks in 6th grade…

Oh gosh, while I am posting and babbling randomly I guess I should put this in to. I made a silly picture:

SnuffleARTagus

Springboard put this “I <3 Art Because…” sign in their spring workshop flier for people to fill in & post photos of. I had gotten into a goofy tweet conversation with Springboarder Noah about artimals (cuz in his pic he is an Aartvark…other good ones included the hippopARTamus and the plARTypus). The workshop flier sat on my art table for several more days, and I couldn’t think of anything that I could say about loving art that would be better than being a SnuffleARTagus. And the empty paper towel & tp rolls in my recycling were calling to me. So there you go. I made a goofy picture. Somehow I always end up taking weird photos of myself in my bathroom. I guess the lighting is really good in there.

Incidentally, Noah is teaching all ten of Springboard’s Work of Art workshops this spring, and they are awesome & super helpful so if you are an artist in the Twin Cities wondering what you need to move your career forward I highly recommend that you check them out. You can buy in bulk and save money! They are packed full of good info like how to price your artwork, marketing, copyright laws, using social media, etc. And Noah tells funny weird stories and does strange things like making a really big deal out of not liking strawberries when you bring them to class and then taking a video of himself eating the strawberry and not liking it. Practical art career guidance + meeting & networking w/other artists + sense of humor = win!

Hmm I did not intend this post to be mostly about Springboard. I intended it to be about how excited I am about my watercolor painting. Mleh. Gonna go eat something and go back to painting now.

Here are a couple of smaller berries paintings in the new series I’m working on. Now that the holidays are over lots of new art opportunities seem to be popping up again so I hope to have an exciting and productive year! Plans for the WARM members show at the Grainbelt are going ok. I’m sure February will be a really busy month getting ready for it. I’m curious to see what kind of submissions we got for the “Temporality” theme.

I’m also nearly done with my sketchbook for the Art House sketchbook project; they extended the deadline and I’ll be mailing it in on Tuesday. Just need to get the last two pages done and I’ll try to scan some more of it before sending it off.

I am loving playing with the transparency of the pages in my sketchbook project. I discovered the delightful possibilities of this right after my last blog update. It’s working really well for my style of line drawing. Unfortunately my scanner does not capture the subtle interaction between drawings on adjacent pages at all so I’ve resorted to taking not-so-great photos of it from the camera on my phone (my rechargeable batteries for my slightly higher quality digital camera don’t work anymore).

I suppose taking a video in a really well lit environment might work better, but I don’t have that capability right now. Not sure whether to feel frustrated that none of my available technology can accurately document my sketchbook project, or proud that I’ve made artwork that defies digitization.

Hope you also enjoy the close up view of my thumbs. The transparency doesn’t work unless you hold the pages flat against each other.

[portfolio_slideshow]

Although I hate to dictate to the viewer what those little circles might represent on the last two pages, you can probably tell that snow is on my mind as I am snowed in here in Minneapolis, Minnesnowda. We’ve gotten almost a foot and a half officially I guess, though the drifts outside the back door are more like two feet. Staying home all day has been a bit lonely since Alex is in Cameroon now for his mother’s funeral, but I kept myself busy putting up my Xmas decorations and trying to start cleaning the kitchen. My graphics design class was canceled, giving me at least another week to procrastinate on preparing the “personal logo” project that I don’t really want to do. It might morph into designing a better header for this blog & website, even though I’m pretty happy with the one I have right now and don’t think that would actually help me practice any of the new skills I’ve learned over the semester. Can you use the term “semester” for a continuing ed class anyway? Sounds weird…

Anyway stay warm out there fellow MN blizzard people!

Update: after a lot of shoveling and gracious help from various neighbors I was able to get my car out of the lot, out of the alley, and onto nicely plowed chicago ave. My thumbs, arms and back are aching from all the shoveling!

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